Download Festival 2012 is GO! – Part 1

While other festivals in the UK take some down time, the organisers behind the beast that we call Download Festival have been hard at work making sure Donington is the place to be come June. With the headliners already confirmed as Black Sabbath, Metallica and The Prodigy, this years Download Festival is going to be massive. So, who will be joining them this year?

Playing Download Festival for the first time ever is none other than Soundgarden, which will be pleasing to the many faithful they have around the UK. Without taking the shine off of such a cool announcement, if you are anything like us, you’ll just be glad that Chris Cornell will not be playing his atrocious solo work and will instead be bringing Donington such massive hits, including what is probably their best known song ‘Black Hole Sun’. It doesn’t really matter whether Soundgarden are playing behind Metallica or Black Sabbath because they fit neatly on both days. For the more mature attendee though, this announcement is a great one.

The most surprising announcement most certainly comes in the form of drum ‘n’ bass act Chase & Status, who will be the warm up act before The Prodigy whip Donington in to a frenzy. You see, it’s one thing having acts like Pendulum hit up Download Festival. They have a very obvious crossover appeal to the rock crowds. You can’t really say the same about Chase & Status so it’s understandable that many a rock fan is going to cry out in shock. Once you drop your allegiance to rock music and acknowledge the fact that they will be playing a bill headlined by The Prodigy, it does start to make a little bit more sense. The simple fact is that most young fans of rock music are also listening to a lot of drum ‘n’ bass, a lot of dubstep, and maybe Download Festival have taken the inevitable step of welcoming this change in listening habits before the rest of it’s competition do so. I mean, you just have to go to a typical rock club to see the same kids singing along to You Me At Six dancing along to the likes of Skrillex.

Speaking of You Me At Six, the young pop punk group will be headlining the Second Stage, with what will no doubt be the bands biggest festival appearance to date. I’ve been fortunate to see the ascension of You Me At Six over the past few years. Whilst they are not a great band on record, it’s been very rewarding to see such genuinely nice guys grow at such a speed. If anyone has any doubt that You Me At Six can’t live up to the expectations of such a high profile position on the Download line up, then you clearly didn’t attend one of the bands most recent headline shows. You Me At Six can have a crowd in the palm of their hands with complete ease with tracks like ‘Bite Your Tongue’ and the huge ‘Underdog’ in their artillery, and if you can’t quite grasp that, I’d simply ask you to head to the Second Stage and acknowledge your incorrect assumptions afterwards.

Rolling in to Donington for their only UK festival appearance of 2012 is none other than Scottish heroes Biffy Clyro, who have been personally invited to Download by headliners Metallica. The trio headlined Sonisphere last year, which just comes to show how powerful a line up Download have for 2012. Any metal fan who attended Sonisphere last year and witnessed Biffy Clyro will tell you that they are a rather intriguing live act. They some how manage to be monstrously loud and beautifully melodic at the same time, and if you are looking for a rock ‘n’ roll band, you just don’t get bands who fit that bill as naturally as Biffy Clyro do. Biffy are a band who don’t need any theatrics. They will rock you, and you will love it.

All the above are pretty good for Download Festival 2012, but the pick of the bunch so far for me just has to be none other than the great Tenacious D. That’s right, Jack Black and Kyle Gass will be playing Donington, bringing their fun festivities to what will hopefully be a sunny, warm evening (we can hope, right?). Tenacious D are probably the most well suited band to play a festival, and in my opinion, the perfect band for Download. Behind the hilarity and all the fun and games, you actually have some pretty great rock music that will have the Download faithful going suitably apeshit come June.

So, that’s the first batch of bands announced in 2012. Here is the second batch!